


Sociopath

by LadyMerlin



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Format, Angst, Available in Chinese, Character Study, Friendship, Gen, Post-Reichenbach
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-28
Updated: 2012-02-28
Packaged: 2017-10-31 20:32:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 975
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/348088
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyMerlin/pseuds/LadyMerlin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock <strike>calls</strike> called himself a Sociopath. John’s a Doctor, and <strike>knows</strike> knew better.</p><p>This fic is now available in Chinese <a href="http://www.mtslash.com/viewthread.php?tid=77112">HERE</a>, by the lovely DTberry :3</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sociopath

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: Guys. IDEK. Seriously, IDEK.
> 
> Spoilers: Up to Season 2 Episode 3, The Reichenbach Fall.
> 
> Disclaimer: I own nothing.

**Sociopath**

**[soh** -see- _uh_ -path,  **soh** -shee-]

IPA: /’soʊsiə,pæθ, ‘soʊʃi-/

_noun_

A person with an antisocial personality disorder, manifested in aggressive, perverted, criminal, or amoral behavior without empathy or remorse, characterized by a tendency to commit antisocial and sometimes violent acts and a failure to feel guilt for such acts.

 _adj._ Sociopath y

**\---*---**

 

Sherlock ~~calls~~ called himself a Sociopath.

 

_“I’m not a psychopath, Anderson,_

_I’m a high-functioning sociopath, do your research!”_

 

John’s a Doctor, and ~~knows~~ knew better.

 

_“Are you playing the violin?”_

_“What does it look like I’m doing?”_

_“It’s beautiful, Sherlock.”_

 

_“Thank you.”_

 

It’s going to take a long time to change the _tense_ of his life.

_John ~~lives~~ lived at 221B Baker Street._

 

**lived**

_verb_

past tense of ‘live’

 **lived** _, as in:_ does not live anymore.

**\---*---**

 

When Sherlock thinks he cannot hear, late at night, when John’s fallen exhausted into bed, aching and bruised and battered and _soaring high_ with the adrenaline rush, he perches on the window seat in the living room of 221B, and makes music.

 

_John wants to go downstairs._

_He_ wants _to sit and listen, where the music isn’t muffled by walls and floors and carpets and emptiness._

_But speaking from experience, he knows better._

_The moment Sherlock hears that squeaky third step on the flight down_

—Which he thinks John doesn’t know why he won’t fix—

_the music will fall_

_quiet._

So John sits in his room, curled up under the blankets which will never be enough to keep the chill from his bones, ever again, and listens, straining for every precious note.

 

And John can make a liar of anyone who claims Sherlock does not feel, sitting on the other side of the house, alone in his room, with nothing but the pale light of the moon and the sound of his own breath.

 

He does not turn on the lights, because Sherlock claims to hear electricity running through the walls, and he’s not quite sure about that but

 

**\---*---**

 

 

“Moriarty is playing with your mind too. Can’t you see what’s going on!?”

_Please John, please please trust me._

“No, I know you’re for real.”

_Of course I do, what kind of question is that?_

“One Hundred Percent.”

_Completely? Do you trust me beyond a shadow of doubt?_

“No one can fake being such an annoying dick all the time.”

_Completely and without reservation, Sherlock._

and

 

“No one could be that clever.”

_“You could.”_

**\---*---**

 

but the thing is, he trusts Sherlock more than anything. And though his bullshit-o-meter is top notch for everyone else, it doesn’t seem to work on Sherlock. And he hates to say this but there is no other word for it, but _faith_.

 

_“I believe in you, Sherlock. Nothing anyone says can change that.”_

He has an unshakeable faith in Sherlock. That’s why he truly believed, for a split second, with the entirety of his being, that when he stood there at Sherlock’s gravestone, and pleadedasked _begged_ , just for a tiny second that Sherlock would

_“stop it. for me. stop it, please.”_

 

**\---*---**

 

And when Sherlock played his violin in the night, in their living room, John knew for a fact that Sherlock was no sociopath. Sherlock was incredible, and amazing, and batshit _crazy_ , and a dick of _massive_ proportions, and _breathtaking_ , and ri _diculously_ high-functioning, but not a sociopath.

 

The sweet ache in the melody of his tunes was evidence enough. As was the sudden, startling burst of delightexcitement _joy_ , the night after a case. And the quiet busy-ness of thought, when Sherlock just wanted something to do with his fingers, and his mind just wouldn’t shut down. And the gentle affection in the lullabies he played for John, when he knew John was awake despite him being in his bed, not making a sound, in the dark of the nighttime.

 

Somehow Sherlock knew him better than he knew himself.

And he knew Sherlock better than Sherlock knew himself.

 

And there had been perfect

symmetry

 

**\---*---**

 

He’d never been able to explain it successfully to anyone.

_I’m telling you, one day he’ll be the one who put that body there._

And he’d failed even when he’d tried.

_I told you so. I told you solving the murders wouldn’t be enough._

_He’s a freak,_

_Watson._

But his failure had mattered more to him than it had to Sherlock.

_I don’t see why it bothers you so much._

 

And Sherlock’s pain, when he’d least wanted to see it

_I’m sorry. It was all a magic trick. None of it was real._

had proven his point at the ultimate cost.

 

 

And it hadn’t even been that great a victory, because no one had heard it but him.

_If a red-wood falls in the forest, with no one to hear it, does it still make a sound?_

 

**\---*---**

 

_That’s what people do, isn’t it?_

_Leave a note?_

_People died._

_That’s what people do!_

**\---*---**

 

And when John recovers from his shock, enough to form coherent thought

_because he will never recover completely; it’s too much to ask_

_when he’s lost the only person who mattered_

_whom he’d mattered to_

he thinks that it’s somehow what Sherlock would have wanted.

 

He’d not have wanted to die, of course. Sherlock was insane but not _that_ insane. He’d have wanted to be remembered (if at all) a sociopath.

 

Completely objective.

Coherent.

Unobstructed by _emotions_.

 

 

And

_I don’t have friends._

_Just the one._

no one else had mattered in their little bubble-universe anyway.

 

 

To Sherlock, it would not have mattered what the world thought.

To John, it meant the world what they thought about _Sherlock_.

 

To John, Sherlock would never be a sociopath.

Because he felt _too_ much. He cared _too much_.

 _Caring is **not** an advantage_.

 

And Sherlock had ignored Mycroft, and cared anyway.

 

**\---*---**

 

And he’d never wanted to be a hero anyway

_because heroes fall_

_but isn’t that what he’d done?_

**Author's Note:**

> Large numbers of Creative Liberties have been taken.
> 
> cross-posted to sherlockbbc @ lj, and to obsessionality @ lj, and to Lady Merlin on FFNet.  
> p.s. it might actually look better (fulfill the visual effect intended) on lj...


End file.
